Things with the truck have been kinda sketchy for a while, but today they went over the edge. I was finding it very difficult to get the truck into gear and - as the evening went on - it became increasingly difficult just to keep it in gear. This would have been bad enough on its own, but I also lost the high side of the engine brake, which made descending the various long grades in Virginia far more nerve-wracking than they needed to be. Attempting to go down a seven-mile long 6% downgrade is particularly frightening when you smell brakes burning, even if it later turns out to be someone else's.
By the time I arrived at the operating center, it was nearly impossible to drive. The truck fell out of gear twice just on the half-mile or so stretch of street between the Interstate and the OC's gate, then once more as I tried idling it to the shop. They wrote it up for maintenance, gave me a rough time estimate, and told me where to park it. Good thing, too; I barely could get it into gear at all because the clutch was nearly seizing up and it was practically impossible to shift out of gear without turning the truck off. There's no way at all this thing could have made it to my delivery tomorrow.
A bit of phone tag with operations later, and I was originally told that this was going to be a relay... then ops called back ten minutes later to tell me that there's so little capacity around here that I'll have to take a loaner and deliver it. I was assured that I'd be routed directly back to the operating center, but I'll believe that one only after I have a work assignment that tells me to stop here. Regardless, I'll have to call first shift in the morning to finalize the details on this run, attempt to get the delivery moved up a few hours, and pester them until they give me a run that brings me back to Charlotte tomorrow evening.
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Rogers, MN - Back and forth
After getting stuck on a rather lousy run in Pennsylvania, I was given a nice trip out to Minnesota, worth over a thousand miles. Getting out here was pretty easy, despite a few routing mistakes, since there are only so many ways one can go on the Interstate. I arrived here slightly earlier than planned despite the detour, largely due to Chicago traffic being far better than anticipated. I get to deliver this thing around 6 in the morning tomorrow, then take a relay back toward Chicago for a Monday delivery. I need a weekend free. :)
Saturday, September 19, 2009
Kennebunk, ME - More early mornings
The last few mornings have been incredibly early starts; I had to be up around 1 AM to try pick a load up Friday morning and had a 5 AM delivery today. Things were going pretty decently yesterday, so I decided to push my luck and try hit a truck stop much closer to the delivery location than I'd originally planned. My hours were running out, so I decided to go to a rest area instead of the truck stop I wanted to reach. That might have worked out well, except that the New York State Police were doing level three inspections. In other words, logbook checks. By the time I arrived there, due to traffic and hills, I was already fifteen minutes over my time for the day.
The officer had his share of issues with the paperwork, though most of them were the sort of mistakes a rookie would make. For one, he asked me to open the trailer to get the VIN and other information off it; that stuff is on a plate right near the gladhands. For another, he thought that "AR" on my logbook was the abbreviation for Arizona, not Arkansas. He also noted that yes, I am pushing it, but "I'm not going to bust your balls for fifteen minutes" he said as he returned everything to me with a clean inspection report. I was forced to park there, of course, but given the shortage of hours I'd planned on that anyway, so I only lost the half hour due to the inspection.
This morning I started as early as I could: 1:30 AM. I had to drive straight through and skip my originally planned fuel stop just to make it on time; I arrived just ten minutes before my appointment time. I checked in, found out we needed a lumper, grumbled about that for a couple minutes, called operations and got "approval" to have them do it, and took a nap while they worked. They finished just after 8 AM, came back with a price, and I called in to get a comcheck for payment. First shift decided to chew me out for not calling in sooner as the genius in support shift apparently decided not to update that information in the computer after I called. I was given a check, but still haven't received an authorization number; without one the fee comes out of my paycheck so I'll need to call first thing Monday morning to get that resolved.
Once the unloading stuff was taken care of, I went to the truck stop I originally was to fuel at and actually filled the truck up with the 51 gallons it needed. Operations wouldn't tell me anything about a work assignment except that I was being held for a customer. Only on the third call was I told that it's unlikely that I'd be assigned anything that would get me moving before a break and I should have considered the time immediately after I parked as the start of my break. I called them out on that, though, and said rather bluntly that if I'm having to get up at 1 in the morning they better find a way of utilizing me since I'm quite tired of busting my tail only to get screwed over again and again. The lady in ops then said she'd see if they'll at least get an assignment pushed out to me before they leave; I had one show up just after 11 for a customer other than the one they claimed I was on hold for.
This assignment is notable for one thing: it's the first time I've been told to deadhead more than 300 miles to get a load. Usually, they try to keep that under 100, or maybe 200 if they're truly desperate to get a load covered, but above that is unheard of for us. I'm not sure what's so special about the load, though; it's a pickup that I can make any time tomorrow (I plan on arriving around 5 AM) and a delivery 500 miles away for Monday at 4 PM. Looking at my hours and the details of this load, I should just be able to make it to the consignee tomorrow afternoon if I try; I sent in a macro asking if we can deliver it then so I'm free much earlier on Monday. If so, I can park on-site there and have a full slate of hours after my break. If not, I can easily claim layover pay for it. So, in this case, I pretty much can't lose. :)
The officer had his share of issues with the paperwork, though most of them were the sort of mistakes a rookie would make. For one, he asked me to open the trailer to get the VIN and other information off it; that stuff is on a plate right near the gladhands. For another, he thought that "AR" on my logbook was the abbreviation for Arizona, not Arkansas. He also noted that yes, I am pushing it, but "I'm not going to bust your balls for fifteen minutes" he said as he returned everything to me with a clean inspection report. I was forced to park there, of course, but given the shortage of hours I'd planned on that anyway, so I only lost the half hour due to the inspection.
This morning I started as early as I could: 1:30 AM. I had to drive straight through and skip my originally planned fuel stop just to make it on time; I arrived just ten minutes before my appointment time. I checked in, found out we needed a lumper, grumbled about that for a couple minutes, called operations and got "approval" to have them do it, and took a nap while they worked. They finished just after 8 AM, came back with a price, and I called in to get a comcheck for payment. First shift decided to chew me out for not calling in sooner as the genius in support shift apparently decided not to update that information in the computer after I called. I was given a check, but still haven't received an authorization number; without one the fee comes out of my paycheck so I'll need to call first thing Monday morning to get that resolved.
Once the unloading stuff was taken care of, I went to the truck stop I originally was to fuel at and actually filled the truck up with the 51 gallons it needed. Operations wouldn't tell me anything about a work assignment except that I was being held for a customer. Only on the third call was I told that it's unlikely that I'd be assigned anything that would get me moving before a break and I should have considered the time immediately after I parked as the start of my break. I called them out on that, though, and said rather bluntly that if I'm having to get up at 1 in the morning they better find a way of utilizing me since I'm quite tired of busting my tail only to get screwed over again and again. The lady in ops then said she'd see if they'll at least get an assignment pushed out to me before they leave; I had one show up just after 11 for a customer other than the one they claimed I was on hold for.
This assignment is notable for one thing: it's the first time I've been told to deadhead more than 300 miles to get a load. Usually, they try to keep that under 100, or maybe 200 if they're truly desperate to get a load covered, but above that is unheard of for us. I'm not sure what's so special about the load, though; it's a pickup that I can make any time tomorrow (I plan on arriving around 5 AM) and a delivery 500 miles away for Monday at 4 PM. Looking at my hours and the details of this load, I should just be able to make it to the consignee tomorrow afternoon if I try; I sent in a macro asking if we can deliver it then so I'm free much earlier on Monday. If so, I can park on-site there and have a full slate of hours after my break. If not, I can easily claim layover pay for it. So, in this case, I pretty much can't lose. :)
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Findlay, OH - Incredibly early mornings
I hate going to New England. There's almost no parking, almost no freight to get out of the area, and it's far too easy to get lost. So, of course, I end up with a load going to Connecticut that delivers at 5 AM Saturday. This means I have to get up around midnight tonight and tomorrow night and hope that I'm coherent enough to keep the truck on the road and on the only legal truck route anywhere near the consignee. It's going to be more than a little unpleasant, but I couldn't find any excuse to get them to take me off the load, leaving me stuck with it. I just hope they promptly get me out of the region since the only nearby parking is a pay lot.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
Evergreen, AL - Three hundred miles to go nowhere
I finally ended up back to work today, though I got a bit of a later start than operations would have liked. I even got put back on the load that I'd told them yesterday that I probably wouldn't be able to pick up, since I had to go so far just to get an empty trailer, but they insisted that I run with it anyway since they found an empty that was more than 50 miles closer (83 v. 140). It worked out, but only just; I made it onto their property less than five minutes before they stopped taking new trucks for shipping. I got away with being in the wrong part of the facility, too, since I had to go from one gate to another, then to a scale, then past there to a fourth location to get the truck loaded. Once that was completed I was given a ticket off the facility's scale and sent on my way.
Since it was already getting kinda late and construction on US 84 cost me quite a bit of time, I just stopped back here in Evergreen for the night. The only other places I could have stopped were in Montgomery (if I were lucky) and potentially the consignee (if they were open past 7 PM), but I was feeling unusually tired so I just called it a day early. I'll have about 150 miles to go tomorrow to deliver this thing; hopefully my next run will be long enough to be worthwhile.
Since it was already getting kinda late and construction on US 84 cost me quite a bit of time, I just stopped back here in Evergreen for the night. The only other places I could have stopped were in Montgomery (if I were lucky) and potentially the consignee (if they were open past 7 PM), but I was feeling unusually tired so I just called it a day early. I'll have about 150 miles to go tomorrow to deliver this thing; hopefully my next run will be long enough to be worthwhile.
Monday, August 31, 2009
Tulsa, OK - There's no place like home, if you can get to it
The weekend was a bit of a mess, to say the least, but ultimately I just parked in Edwardsville, IL to do laundry and just relax for about half a day. I left there fairly late yesterday afternoon, stopped in Joplin, MO for the night, and left about three hours ago to make it down here for my delivery appointment. They're unloading me now, but once I'm out of here I get to head to Muskogee to pick up my next load and head in the general direction of home. It'll put me in northern Mississippi, about half a day's drive from the place I usually park the truck, so it's conceivable I'll actually get home a day early for a change. Of course that's entirely speculative until I actually get my next work assignment, though I have talked to operations and asked them to get back to me with a plan soon as they can.
I also talked them into reimbursing me for a motel room while the truck was in the shop, fixing a few runs so I get paid for 150 miles worth of extra running around their screw ups caused me to do, and have a vague plan in place to get some personal things done by the end of the year. All of this means that things might at least be slightly less screwed up in the long run and I'm getting reimbursed for the things that go wrong in the short run. Not a bad morning.
I also talked them into reimbursing me for a motel room while the truck was in the shop, fixing a few runs so I get paid for 150 miles worth of extra running around their screw ups caused me to do, and have a vague plan in place to get some personal things done by the end of the year. All of this means that things might at least be slightly less screwed up in the long run and I'm getting reimbursed for the things that go wrong in the short run. Not a bad morning.
Friday, August 28, 2009
Too many palletsW
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Columbus, OH - The who with the where now?
Things have gotten rather interesting with regard to this next load. I started off painfully early this morning (2:30 AM), made a fuel stop, and arrived at the consignee for the previous load about half an hour early. Good thing, too, since it took three attempts to get a valid delivery number, which was erroneously listed as a bill of lading number. You'd think that customer service could at least keep track of what number is good for what. Once out of there, I had another load, this time going to Delaware. There were a few problems with being assigned this, namely that I probably don't have enough hours to go all the way out there in two days (I'd have about 10 on my 70) and I was promised that I'd be kept off the east coast. I was told to pick it up while they looked for alternatives, such as a relay.
So I dropped my now-empty trailer, got the paperwork, found the loaded trailer... and found it to be missing its PM sticker. I called road repair and was told that it was overdue for a PM and that it needed to be done before the load could head toward its destination. So I called ops to tell them what was going on (and to reiterate that we really needed to relay the load) and went to the OC. Upon arriving, I parked the truck and trailer, went into the shop, and found out that the trailer had a PM done back in April; nobody had bothered to update it until now. So I was given the PM sticker, called ops to update it, and was told to just drop the load as a relay to ensure that I didn't get totally screwed over on time.
After taking care of all that, I told ops that I'm interested in taking a 34-hour restart in either Indianapolis or Seville, OH; there aren't even shower facilities here at the Columbus OC so staying here is definitely not an option that I'd like to be stuck with. However, another phone call has revealed that there's no freight that would get me to another operating center and, with my 14 dwindling down, it's looking increasingly unlikely that I'll get something that would get me to an OC. There's still an outside shot of making it to Indianapolis, if something comes up in the next half hour or so, but beyond that I'd have to get either really creative with my logbook or just concede defeat and stay parked here in Columbus for the next two days. I should have a final answer within the next half hour.
So I dropped my now-empty trailer, got the paperwork, found the loaded trailer... and found it to be missing its PM sticker. I called road repair and was told that it was overdue for a PM and that it needed to be done before the load could head toward its destination. So I called ops to tell them what was going on (and to reiterate that we really needed to relay the load) and went to the OC. Upon arriving, I parked the truck and trailer, went into the shop, and found out that the trailer had a PM done back in April; nobody had bothered to update it until now. So I was given the PM sticker, called ops to update it, and was told to just drop the load as a relay to ensure that I didn't get totally screwed over on time.
After taking care of all that, I told ops that I'm interested in taking a 34-hour restart in either Indianapolis or Seville, OH; there aren't even shower facilities here at the Columbus OC so staying here is definitely not an option that I'd like to be stuck with. However, another phone call has revealed that there's no freight that would get me to another operating center and, with my 14 dwindling down, it's looking increasingly unlikely that I'll get something that would get me to an OC. There's still an outside shot of making it to Indianapolis, if something comes up in the next half hour or so, but beyond that I'd have to get either really creative with my logbook or just concede defeat and stay parked here in Columbus for the next two days. I should have a final answer within the next half hour.
Monday, August 24, 2009
Binghamton, NY - A shade of sanity
Another day of madness, but at least I can say with relatively high confidence that things should settle down a bit, at least for tomorrow. I woke up early, grabbed an empty, went to my first pick up stop... only to find out that they didn't have shipping labels for UPS. After about 45 minutes of phone calls and such, the decision was made that I should make what originally was the second stop first, then backtrack, which added about 80 miles of driving around Boston. The second stop was simple enough, though finding it was not: I had to improvise my own route to get there and my choices ended up involving a few 13'6" high overpasses and left me parked quite illegally on a state route as I tried to figure out where the truck entrance was (in the back, down an alley marked clearly "no trucks").
Once loaded I headed back to the first place, got my load there in about an hour, and started making time. A quick food stop and a fuel stop were all I did along the way and I arrived here having exhausted my 14 hours for the day and my 70 hours for the last eight days. Tomorrow leaves me with just six hours available, of which half an hour will be consumed by a pre-trip; I'm still going to try cram over 300 miles in the remaining time so I can make it into Ohio. My delivery is pretty much a non-issue unless I severely oversleep or have some other unforseeable issue arise, since I'll be picking up plenty of hours and only need to go 200 miles to the warehouse. This means I actually can sleep in 'til 4 AM, instead of having to get up at three or earlier, and should be able to get to bed at a reasonable hour instead of having to try sleep in the middle of the afternoon. Hopefully that trend will continue.
Once loaded I headed back to the first place, got my load there in about an hour, and started making time. A quick food stop and a fuel stop were all I did along the way and I arrived here having exhausted my 14 hours for the day and my 70 hours for the last eight days. Tomorrow leaves me with just six hours available, of which half an hour will be consumed by a pre-trip; I'm still going to try cram over 300 miles in the remaining time so I can make it into Ohio. My delivery is pretty much a non-issue unless I severely oversleep or have some other unforseeable issue arise, since I'll be picking up plenty of hours and only need to go 200 miles to the warehouse. This means I actually can sleep in 'til 4 AM, instead of having to get up at three or earlier, and should be able to get to bed at a reasonable hour instead of having to try sleep in the middle of the afternoon. Hopefully that trend will continue.
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Westborough, MA - I drove all night
Hoo boy. Sometimes so many things get screwed up in such a short period of time that I'm not even sure where to begin a post like this! My last work assignment looked pretty darned good at first glance: pick up something by 10 PM and deliver it by 2 AM Monday. Things fell apart pretty quickly once I got to the customer at 11 AM though; they told me to go away because I was too early and that the load would not be ready until at least 4 PM. Given the hours of service rules involved, 4 PM just wasn't going to work well, since I'd have to find parking almost immediately after picking it up, then drive 560 miles in one shot, drop the trailer off, and somehow find parking near Boston in the evening. So I called in and tried to get things changed.
Operations, however, didn't want to budge on any of it. The first person I talked to insisted that I have enough hours and, therefore, there is no reason I shouldn't be able to pick up the load and deliver it on time. Never mind the fact that I'd have had to go to sleep immediately and get moving immediately after ten hours. I tried explaining that but he wouldn't listen at all, though he begrudgingly said he'd work on it. On my way to find parking, I got a message saying that the pick up deadline was moved back to 10:30 - just a half hour added - and that I had plenty of time to get it done so I should stop complaining. I called in again ,hoping to get someone else who actually understood what the problem was.
Amazingly, the second person did actually get where I was coming from. He looked around for someone else to cover the load, since he recognized my concerns about falling asleep at the wheel to be valid, but it turns out that I was the only available driver within 200 miles with a hazmat endorsement. So much for that endorsement being a requirement to work for the company. He just said get there when I feel like I can safely get there. So I had lunch, tried to sleep, and managed to get two separate three-hour naps in. I felt pretty decent when I woke up the second time around 9 PM, so I just decided to go run with it anyway.
Pretty much everything went smoothly with regard to picking up the load and driving it to my destination near Boston. It was lighter than expected so I didn't have to scale it out, traffic was a complete non-issue since I was driving at night, all the weigh stations were closed... as such, I arrived up here about an hour ahead of schedule. Good thing, too, because it all went sideways after I got off the freeway. I made a wrong turn due to incredibly confusing signs. Twice. This is a big problem in a semi. The first time I nervously crawled the truck down a residential road to get back onto the main highway, clearing power lines by terrifyingly slim margins, but managed to get it turned around. The second I had to back up a couple feet to make an ambiguously labeled turn, complete with a posted twelve-ton weight limit. Why a trucking facility is behind such a slim limit is beyond me, as the tractor alone weighs nearly that much.
Upon arriving at the consignee, I looked around for someone to sign the bills so I could be rid of the thing, but apparently everyone was home for the weekend. There was a toll-free number to call in that event though, so I called in the load information, got permission to drop the trailer, left the paperwork on the box, and took a look at my next load.
The next load I have is a ... well, I don't have a family-friendly word I can use to describe it. I have to pick up an empty trailer from a drop yard and stop at two separate places near Boston tomorrow morning, then try to head to New York state to get my third pickup by noon Tuesday and make it to Columbus Wednesday morning. This wouldn't be so hard if my 70 hours were nearly up; I have only nine hours for tomorrow and just six rolling off the day after that. As such, I might only be able to get halfway to the third shipper tomorrow, use most of my remaining time getting there Tuesday morning, and have to start obscenely early on Wednesday to make things work out. I don't have things planned out very well, mostly because it all hinges on how much driving time I have left after I pick up the first two-thirds of this load.
Overall, the only good thing is that I have about fifteen hours to try regain my composure and catch up on some sleep. I really wish I were taking a 34-hour restart somewhere instead of being pushed to the limit day after day.
Operations, however, didn't want to budge on any of it. The first person I talked to insisted that I have enough hours and, therefore, there is no reason I shouldn't be able to pick up the load and deliver it on time. Never mind the fact that I'd have had to go to sleep immediately and get moving immediately after ten hours. I tried explaining that but he wouldn't listen at all, though he begrudgingly said he'd work on it. On my way to find parking, I got a message saying that the pick up deadline was moved back to 10:30 - just a half hour added - and that I had plenty of time to get it done so I should stop complaining. I called in again ,hoping to get someone else who actually understood what the problem was.
Amazingly, the second person did actually get where I was coming from. He looked around for someone else to cover the load, since he recognized my concerns about falling asleep at the wheel to be valid, but it turns out that I was the only available driver within 200 miles with a hazmat endorsement. So much for that endorsement being a requirement to work for the company. He just said get there when I feel like I can safely get there. So I had lunch, tried to sleep, and managed to get two separate three-hour naps in. I felt pretty decent when I woke up the second time around 9 PM, so I just decided to go run with it anyway.
Pretty much everything went smoothly with regard to picking up the load and driving it to my destination near Boston. It was lighter than expected so I didn't have to scale it out, traffic was a complete non-issue since I was driving at night, all the weigh stations were closed... as such, I arrived up here about an hour ahead of schedule. Good thing, too, because it all went sideways after I got off the freeway. I made a wrong turn due to incredibly confusing signs. Twice. This is a big problem in a semi. The first time I nervously crawled the truck down a residential road to get back onto the main highway, clearing power lines by terrifyingly slim margins, but managed to get it turned around. The second I had to back up a couple feet to make an ambiguously labeled turn, complete with a posted twelve-ton weight limit. Why a trucking facility is behind such a slim limit is beyond me, as the tractor alone weighs nearly that much.
Upon arriving at the consignee, I looked around for someone to sign the bills so I could be rid of the thing, but apparently everyone was home for the weekend. There was a toll-free number to call in that event though, so I called in the load information, got permission to drop the trailer, left the paperwork on the box, and took a look at my next load.
The next load I have is a ... well, I don't have a family-friendly word I can use to describe it. I have to pick up an empty trailer from a drop yard and stop at two separate places near Boston tomorrow morning, then try to head to New York state to get my third pickup by noon Tuesday and make it to Columbus Wednesday morning. This wouldn't be so hard if my 70 hours were nearly up; I have only nine hours for tomorrow and just six rolling off the day after that. As such, I might only be able to get halfway to the third shipper tomorrow, use most of my remaining time getting there Tuesday morning, and have to start obscenely early on Wednesday to make things work out. I don't have things planned out very well, mostly because it all hinges on how much driving time I have left after I pick up the first two-thirds of this load.
Overall, the only good thing is that I have about fifteen hours to try regain my composure and catch up on some sleep. I really wish I were taking a 34-hour restart somewhere instead of being pushed to the limit day after day.
Friday, August 21, 2009
New Castle, PA - Must I do everything myself?
Another day, another long series of frustrations. At least this time, though, most of them were resolved!
The morning started off with, unsurprisingly, no information at all from operations. I started moving east, stopped for fuel at an operating center, then called in to see if anyone had done anything. This was just after six, so while people were in at first shift, the person I normally talk to hadn't arrived yet. So I continued on - mostly due to his insistence - with the intention of calling in after seven to get the usual guy. I found a rest area, called in, and only then did someone bother calling the consignee. I ended up on hold for an hour, but we eventually did get confirmation that they'd wait up for me and unload me immediately upon arrival. It only took me calling in five times to get them to do it; I could have saved at least an hour by not having to wait on information like that.
I arrived at the customer around 11:30, got unloaded in considerably more time than expected, then started heading through Pittsburgh to get to my next pick up. Just driving there was a disaster; I had two sets of directions and both were illegal so I had to try improvise. It didn't go very well either, as I had to make a few changes to the route and use an exit on the Interstate to get turned around to head the right way. Once I found the industrial park, things didn't get any better, as a train had somehow gotten stuck on the tracks in the middle of the road and they were routing people through the industrial park at random. I had to get turned around twice, including one dubious maneuver through a gravel lot, before I gave up and called the shipper to ask where they were. Perhaps ironically, I was actually directly in front of their building when I called; I drove right past their docks while following the detour the police were enforcing.
The live load also took longer than expected, not least of which due to the fifteen minutes I was lost in the industrial park. So it went from being an outside shot of making delivery before my hours ran out to, quite simply, having no chance in hell of doing it. I called to inform operations of this and was assured I'd have an answer by the end of the day (doesn't that line sound familiar?) so I went to the nearest truck stop to scale the load and park for my break. I had to call again once I got here since I'd never gotten an answer, but this time someone actually had bothered calling the customer the first time and we had the delivery rescheduled for tomorrow morning between 6 and 7 AM. Given that I'm a little over 150 miles away from their warehouse, that means I have to get moving at an obnoxiously early hour; this makes three days in a row that I'll have had to wake up before 4 AM.
I already have my next work assignment, but I don't like it at all; I have to go into the New England states. There's almost never any freight up there, especially on the weekend, and parking is impossible to come by. If I don't have another load lined up by the time I deliver this one, I'm pretty much screwed. But I'll cross that metaphorical bridge when I come to it, as that won't be for at least 36 hours and I have more pressing things to take care of in the meantime.
The morning started off with, unsurprisingly, no information at all from operations. I started moving east, stopped for fuel at an operating center, then called in to see if anyone had done anything. This was just after six, so while people were in at first shift, the person I normally talk to hadn't arrived yet. So I continued on - mostly due to his insistence - with the intention of calling in after seven to get the usual guy. I found a rest area, called in, and only then did someone bother calling the consignee. I ended up on hold for an hour, but we eventually did get confirmation that they'd wait up for me and unload me immediately upon arrival. It only took me calling in five times to get them to do it; I could have saved at least an hour by not having to wait on information like that.
I arrived at the customer around 11:30, got unloaded in considerably more time than expected, then started heading through Pittsburgh to get to my next pick up. Just driving there was a disaster; I had two sets of directions and both were illegal so I had to try improvise. It didn't go very well either, as I had to make a few changes to the route and use an exit on the Interstate to get turned around to head the right way. Once I found the industrial park, things didn't get any better, as a train had somehow gotten stuck on the tracks in the middle of the road and they were routing people through the industrial park at random. I had to get turned around twice, including one dubious maneuver through a gravel lot, before I gave up and called the shipper to ask where they were. Perhaps ironically, I was actually directly in front of their building when I called; I drove right past their docks while following the detour the police were enforcing.
The live load also took longer than expected, not least of which due to the fifteen minutes I was lost in the industrial park. So it went from being an outside shot of making delivery before my hours ran out to, quite simply, having no chance in hell of doing it. I called to inform operations of this and was assured I'd have an answer by the end of the day (doesn't that line sound familiar?) so I went to the nearest truck stop to scale the load and park for my break. I had to call again once I got here since I'd never gotten an answer, but this time someone actually had bothered calling the customer the first time and we had the delivery rescheduled for tomorrow morning between 6 and 7 AM. Given that I'm a little over 150 miles away from their warehouse, that means I have to get moving at an obnoxiously early hour; this makes three days in a row that I'll have had to wake up before 4 AM.
I already have my next work assignment, but I don't like it at all; I have to go into the New England states. There's almost never any freight up there, especially on the weekend, and parking is impossible to come by. If I don't have another load lined up by the time I deliver this one, I'm pretty much screwed. But I'll cross that metaphorical bridge when I come to it, as that won't be for at least 36 hours and I have more pressing things to take care of in the meantime.
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Beaverdam, OH - Pumpkin Ping Pong
Things have been quite stressful and I have to get in bed shortly, due to a 3:45 AM alarm clock, but I wanted to write a short update of what happened today. The day started off simply enough: I woke up at 3:45 to get to the consignee on time, stopped for nothing but fuel, and made it with about 45 minutes to spare. Along the way I got my next work assignment. The first red flag was the estimated delivery time; even the trip planning computer didn't see any way I could get there less than half an hour late and this was reflected on the assignment I received. Adding to the confusion was the complete lack of a bill of lading or pickup number.
Along the way to the shipper, as I desperately tried to make up time, I started playing Qualcomm tag with the customer service department. I eventually was let in on a particularly odd piece of information. The load is a "blind" load, in that the shipper is not supposed to know where the load is actually going to. Think about that for just a moment: I'm hauling twenty tons of stuff and we're lying to the company who is paying us to haul it about where it's actually going. If that makes any sense to you whatsoever, then please explain it to me. After thus ruling out every piece of information I'd received about the load, the customer service department finally sent me a PO number, which was all I needed to get the load.
Once I arrived at the shipper, I saw one of our guys trying to pull a trailer out of the building. I figured he was leaving with it, but no, we weren't about to be so lucky. Turns out that this place requires drivers to put an empty trailer in the dock they take their load from. That may sound simple in principle, but it adds a substantial amount of work: we have to drop the empty trailer, grab the loaded trailer and move it out of the way, drop the loaded trailer, pick up the empty and try back it into the dock, drop the empty, get the paperwork from the shipping office, and only then can we grab the loaded trailer and leave. Compounding the issue, there was perhaps 25 feet between the front of the trailers and the cars parked directly opposite the dock doors. Even worse, because of the way things were configured, every other driver who needed to use the facility ended up blocking me in while they did what they needed to do, including two of our own guys. I had to help both of them, but neither one of them would offer any help to me at all, the good for nothing @#*$(@s...
In any event, what should have just been a half-hour drop and hook turned into a two hour ordeal. This made my delivery appointment for 7:30 AM - which looked unlikely enough from the beginning - into a complete physical impossibility. I conveyed this to operations and was told to call back in once I scaled the load and had a firm estimate of when I could deliver the load. So I went about ten miles the other direction since that was the nearest scale (I later discovered, much to my dismay, that there were other scales along the way), ensured that the load was legal, and called back in to operations with a firm estimate of 12 noon. I explained why, sent in the appropriate Qualcomm messages, and was assured that we'd "have an answer by the end of the day" with regard to a changed delivery appointment. So I started driving and... unsurprisingly, never got an answer. Go figure, right?
By the time I shut down for the night, I still hadn't gotten an answer about the delivery appointment. So I called support shift about it and was told that nobody had actually done any work on trying to get the delivery appointment changed. Apparently there wasn't even a note showing up in the system that someone needed to work on it, or anything other than my message saying that I wasn't going to be able to make it until noon. So I was put on hold for two minutes while he checked with customer service and told someone would send me a message when and if anything changes but, unless I hear otherwise, to proceed and try make it there as soon as possible. I plan on stopping somewhere along the way to call and get confirmation of what's going on, since this has gone beyond merely being ridiculous and into behavior I can only describe as malicious.
Regardless of what happens at this point, my alarm is still set for 3:45 and I plan on getting moving unless I'm told otherwise. If they move the delivery back more than a day, I'll ask about relaying the thing in Akron, OH. If they still haven't sent me some sort of confirmation about the new time, I'll be stopping before I make it into Pennsylvania for fuel and asking for verification of things before I get onto the turnpike. I'll be pleasantly surprised to hear anything at all, though.
Along the way to the shipper, as I desperately tried to make up time, I started playing Qualcomm tag with the customer service department. I eventually was let in on a particularly odd piece of information. The load is a "blind" load, in that the shipper is not supposed to know where the load is actually going to. Think about that for just a moment: I'm hauling twenty tons of stuff and we're lying to the company who is paying us to haul it about where it's actually going. If that makes any sense to you whatsoever, then please explain it to me. After thus ruling out every piece of information I'd received about the load, the customer service department finally sent me a PO number, which was all I needed to get the load.
Once I arrived at the shipper, I saw one of our guys trying to pull a trailer out of the building. I figured he was leaving with it, but no, we weren't about to be so lucky. Turns out that this place requires drivers to put an empty trailer in the dock they take their load from. That may sound simple in principle, but it adds a substantial amount of work: we have to drop the empty trailer, grab the loaded trailer and move it out of the way, drop the loaded trailer, pick up the empty and try back it into the dock, drop the empty, get the paperwork from the shipping office, and only then can we grab the loaded trailer and leave. Compounding the issue, there was perhaps 25 feet between the front of the trailers and the cars parked directly opposite the dock doors. Even worse, because of the way things were configured, every other driver who needed to use the facility ended up blocking me in while they did what they needed to do, including two of our own guys. I had to help both of them, but neither one of them would offer any help to me at all, the good for nothing @#*$(@s...
In any event, what should have just been a half-hour drop and hook turned into a two hour ordeal. This made my delivery appointment for 7:30 AM - which looked unlikely enough from the beginning - into a complete physical impossibility. I conveyed this to operations and was told to call back in once I scaled the load and had a firm estimate of when I could deliver the load. So I went about ten miles the other direction since that was the nearest scale (I later discovered, much to my dismay, that there were other scales along the way), ensured that the load was legal, and called back in to operations with a firm estimate of 12 noon. I explained why, sent in the appropriate Qualcomm messages, and was assured that we'd "have an answer by the end of the day" with regard to a changed delivery appointment. So I started driving and... unsurprisingly, never got an answer. Go figure, right?
By the time I shut down for the night, I still hadn't gotten an answer about the delivery appointment. So I called support shift about it and was told that nobody had actually done any work on trying to get the delivery appointment changed. Apparently there wasn't even a note showing up in the system that someone needed to work on it, or anything other than my message saying that I wasn't going to be able to make it until noon. So I was put on hold for two minutes while he checked with customer service and told someone would send me a message when and if anything changes but, unless I hear otherwise, to proceed and try make it there as soon as possible. I plan on stopping somewhere along the way to call and get confirmation of what's going on, since this has gone beyond merely being ridiculous and into behavior I can only describe as malicious.
Regardless of what happens at this point, my alarm is still set for 3:45 and I plan on getting moving unless I'm told otherwise. If they move the delivery back more than a day, I'll ask about relaying the thing in Akron, OH. If they still haven't sent me some sort of confirmation about the new time, I'll be stopping before I make it into Pennsylvania for fuel and asking for verification of things before I get onto the turnpike. I'll be pleasantly surprised to hear anything at all, though.
Monday, July 27, 2009
Big Springs, NE - Wild ride
Things with work have actually being going remarkably well lately, which is why I haven't written much in here. After all, it's more interesting to write about conflict than to just go on about a perfect day after a perfect day.
In the interest of keeping this brief, I've had three weekends in a row in Gary, IN, but finally broke out of that streak with a run heading out west. I detoured to Denver and took a day off there instead before delivering in Ogden, UT yesterday, capping off another 1200 mile run. My next assignment? Pick up a load in Wyoming and go 1200 miles back east to... wait for it... Gary, IN. Well, not really, but it's fewer than ten miles from the operating center there and I plan on waiting at the OC on Wednesday for my delivery appointment Thursday morning.
Though things overall are going well, that's not to say that there haven't been a few snags along the way. This morning I managed to grab an empty trailer with a small hole in a top corner; it was completely impossible to see in the dark due to the awkward position but pretty obvious once the sun came up. They had me take it to the customer anyway, though; they'll have someone go out there to fix it, sooner or later. Less than two miles from the customer, though, I heard a sudden shattering - no impact, just a shatter - as a golf-ball sized crack materialized in the driver's side of my windshield. It doesn't impact my visibility thankfully, as it's in the lower right corner, but it is an item that I'll have to get fixed once I make it to the operating center. My day was cut a bit short by a tire blowout, further adding to the maintenance bill; there's a 24-hour shop only eight miles up the road, though, so I should be able to limp there in the morning to get it replaced.
All these issues have thrown some significant doubts on my trip plan, but I still have an outside chance of making it to Chicagoland a full day early and banking yet another day of layover pay. It all depends on whether or not the shop can actually get me out of there in under an hour as the emergency maintenance hotline claimed. Hopefully the place will have somewhere I can get a quick bite to eat so I can at least save an additional stop.
In the interest of keeping this brief, I've had three weekends in a row in Gary, IN, but finally broke out of that streak with a run heading out west. I detoured to Denver and took a day off there instead before delivering in Ogden, UT yesterday, capping off another 1200 mile run. My next assignment? Pick up a load in Wyoming and go 1200 miles back east to... wait for it... Gary, IN. Well, not really, but it's fewer than ten miles from the operating center there and I plan on waiting at the OC on Wednesday for my delivery appointment Thursday morning.
Though things overall are going well, that's not to say that there haven't been a few snags along the way. This morning I managed to grab an empty trailer with a small hole in a top corner; it was completely impossible to see in the dark due to the awkward position but pretty obvious once the sun came up. They had me take it to the customer anyway, though; they'll have someone go out there to fix it, sooner or later. Less than two miles from the customer, though, I heard a sudden shattering - no impact, just a shatter - as a golf-ball sized crack materialized in the driver's side of my windshield. It doesn't impact my visibility thankfully, as it's in the lower right corner, but it is an item that I'll have to get fixed once I make it to the operating center. My day was cut a bit short by a tire blowout, further adding to the maintenance bill; there's a 24-hour shop only eight miles up the road, though, so I should be able to limp there in the morning to get it replaced.
All these issues have thrown some significant doubts on my trip plan, but I still have an outside chance of making it to Chicagoland a full day early and banking yet another day of layover pay. It all depends on whether or not the shop can actually get me out of there in under an hour as the emergency maintenance hotline claimed. Hopefully the place will have somewhere I can get a quick bite to eat so I can at least save an additional stop.
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Gary, IN - Another weekend in dystopia
Things actually have been going well the last couple of days. Once I finally got out of Gary to deliver that load from last weekend, I had a quick run up to Maine and a trip straight back here to Chicagoland. They've actually had decent information on these loads, decent directions, and all that good stuff. This has been the kind of week that exemplifies what things should be how things are more often. As such, there's really nothing that dramatic to write about; I could talk about the weather, but that's about it.
Friday, July 3, 2009
Gary, IN - A couple days of nothingness
The last few days could most politely be described as frustrating. I started off in Indianapolis, waiting for a load that delivered Wednesday. I had originally been told it wouldn't even be there until Tuesday evening, but when I went to pick up the paperwork, it turns out that it was dropped off Monday evening and I could have saved a lot of time and hassle by getting there earlier than I did. But, since nobody bothered to tell me, I spent an extra day sitting around and doing nothing.
In any case, I knew it was going to be a long run; I had to go 600 miles and still leave enough time to find a truck stop to park at. I left early enough to avoid Chicago's rush hour, but a truck fire on I-90 north of the city had traffic backed up for a couple miles and cost me most of the time I had to spare. To further add to the annoyance, my Qualcomm went on the fritz so I couldn't send in a message about it; I had to call while stopped in traffic. My DBL said he was going to look into it and that I should call him back later in the afternoon to find out what we could do.
So I keep driving along and it becomes quite obvious that I'm going to get to this place with zero hours to run and not have anywhere to park there. Of course my DBL never told me that they were going to be in a meeting in the afternoon so rather than talking to him I get someone at support shift who insists I can continue to drive over my 14 legally just because the customer doesn't allow parking. She refused to even look into rescheduling or making other arrangements.
With no way of talking some sense into the support shift person, I proceeded to the customer and arrived just as my 11 and 14 ran out. They had multiple signs up saying "no parking" and "violators will be towed" so it was pretty obvious I couldn't park there despite the insistence of the support shift person. I did find a truck stop 15 miles away, but that left me 45 minutes over my 14 as well. This is the second time in under two weeks I've been forced into a logging violation because nobody in operations listens when I say that I can't legally deliver a load and find a legal parking place.
So, having gotten that mess sorted out and finding that my Qualcomm was still acting up, I called in to see what my next work assignment was. It was certainly a decent one: just over 800 miles delivering in Columbus by Saturday morning. So I went to bed, slept in a bit, and woke up to get it. While I was driving there I received messages asking me when I was going to pick up; I still couldn't read anything so I could only guess I was on the same load. That turned out not to be the case, though; the load I was on was canceled and I was given something with half as many miles that I needed to have picked up four hours ago. I called in, furious about it, but got met with a dismissal of "I don't want to argue" when I called them on the crap. Ultimately I was just told to go pick it up anyway and to call when I got there to find out what freight was like for the weekend.
The directions I had to the shipper were pretty bad and didn't account for a road being closed to trucks due to construction. I lost nearly 20 minutes just trying to get around that mess and find the correct entrance. Once there, though, I was in and out under an hour, which helped make up quite a bit of time I'd lost earlier in the day by running 75 miles in the wrong direction to pick up that canceled load. From there it was just a race against time to try deliver it by 10 PM. While caught in traffic on Minneapolis' Interstates, though, I received a message telling me that the load had been reconsigned to another location 30 miles from the old one. No other information was given; they just sent me a customer code and omitted an address, appointment number, or any other useful information.
I arrived there just after 10 PM (slightly later than I was supposed to but I had to get fuel) and they seemed very confused to see me. My bill of lading listed the original consignee and had no information at all about delivering there. They unloaded me anyway and let me park there overnight; if I had to drive to the Gary OC I would have once again been stuck logging a violation as I had zero hours left on my 14 by the time they finished unloading the trailer.
This morning I woke up to a message saying that freight is incredibly soft across the country - presumably due to the holiday weekend - but that they were going to look for anything they could. I called to find out what my options were, but I was told to go to Gary and call when I arrived. Two hours later, I called from the OC and found out that there are 27 loads in the computer here, all of which are live unload appointments for early next week. All the ones delivering Monday were under 250 miles. The one I got is a live unload Tuesday morning at 8 AM Eastern about 650 miles away. The loaded trailer will be ready to grab by midnight tonight, but I don't have to get it right away; it's an open pick up appointment.
So, since another driver I know just arrived here in Gary and neither of us has a load for the next day or so, I have time to kill and someone to get food with. I suppose it could be far worse for the weekend.
In any case, I knew it was going to be a long run; I had to go 600 miles and still leave enough time to find a truck stop to park at. I left early enough to avoid Chicago's rush hour, but a truck fire on I-90 north of the city had traffic backed up for a couple miles and cost me most of the time I had to spare. To further add to the annoyance, my Qualcomm went on the fritz so I couldn't send in a message about it; I had to call while stopped in traffic. My DBL said he was going to look into it and that I should call him back later in the afternoon to find out what we could do.
So I keep driving along and it becomes quite obvious that I'm going to get to this place with zero hours to run and not have anywhere to park there. Of course my DBL never told me that they were going to be in a meeting in the afternoon so rather than talking to him I get someone at support shift who insists I can continue to drive over my 14 legally just because the customer doesn't allow parking. She refused to even look into rescheduling or making other arrangements.
With no way of talking some sense into the support shift person, I proceeded to the customer and arrived just as my 11 and 14 ran out. They had multiple signs up saying "no parking" and "violators will be towed" so it was pretty obvious I couldn't park there despite the insistence of the support shift person. I did find a truck stop 15 miles away, but that left me 45 minutes over my 14 as well. This is the second time in under two weeks I've been forced into a logging violation because nobody in operations listens when I say that I can't legally deliver a load and find a legal parking place.
So, having gotten that mess sorted out and finding that my Qualcomm was still acting up, I called in to see what my next work assignment was. It was certainly a decent one: just over 800 miles delivering in Columbus by Saturday morning. So I went to bed, slept in a bit, and woke up to get it. While I was driving there I received messages asking me when I was going to pick up; I still couldn't read anything so I could only guess I was on the same load. That turned out not to be the case, though; the load I was on was canceled and I was given something with half as many miles that I needed to have picked up four hours ago. I called in, furious about it, but got met with a dismissal of "I don't want to argue" when I called them on the crap. Ultimately I was just told to go pick it up anyway and to call when I got there to find out what freight was like for the weekend.
The directions I had to the shipper were pretty bad and didn't account for a road being closed to trucks due to construction. I lost nearly 20 minutes just trying to get around that mess and find the correct entrance. Once there, though, I was in and out under an hour, which helped make up quite a bit of time I'd lost earlier in the day by running 75 miles in the wrong direction to pick up that canceled load. From there it was just a race against time to try deliver it by 10 PM. While caught in traffic on Minneapolis' Interstates, though, I received a message telling me that the load had been reconsigned to another location 30 miles from the old one. No other information was given; they just sent me a customer code and omitted an address, appointment number, or any other useful information.
I arrived there just after 10 PM (slightly later than I was supposed to but I had to get fuel) and they seemed very confused to see me. My bill of lading listed the original consignee and had no information at all about delivering there. They unloaded me anyway and let me park there overnight; if I had to drive to the Gary OC I would have once again been stuck logging a violation as I had zero hours left on my 14 by the time they finished unloading the trailer.
This morning I woke up to a message saying that freight is incredibly soft across the country - presumably due to the holiday weekend - but that they were going to look for anything they could. I called to find out what my options were, but I was told to go to Gary and call when I arrived. Two hours later, I called from the OC and found out that there are 27 loads in the computer here, all of which are live unload appointments for early next week. All the ones delivering Monday were under 250 miles. The one I got is a live unload Tuesday morning at 8 AM Eastern about 650 miles away. The loaded trailer will be ready to grab by midnight tonight, but I don't have to get it right away; it's an open pick up appointment.
So, since another driver I know just arrived here in Gary and neither of us has a load for the next day or so, I have time to kill and someone to get food with. I suppose it could be far worse for the weekend.
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Cusseta, GA - Two flats for the price of one!
Things were going fairly well this morning. I got up a little later than planned, perhaps, but otherwise all was fine and dandy until I noticed an ever-increasing cloud of smoke coming from my right-rear trailer tires. Given that I'm on US 280 and there's not really a shoulder - it's maybe two feet wide - I kept driving trying to find a safe place to pull over. This would have worked if I weren't in such a rural area, perhaps, but instead it resulted in me losing the other tire on that side as well and the rims starting to bounce on the ground, resulting in sparks. Soon as I saw sparking I just pulled as far over as I could and stopped; I'm blocking the right lane of the highway but there's no way I could possibly proceed any further up the road. So now I have the joy of waiting for road repair yet again; they should be here in another 45 minutes or so.
In the meantime, have some photos of the resulting carnage; it's been too long since I've posted images here anyway.
Update (8:54 AM): Road repair is here, and not a moment too soon; the sheriff's deputy who was keeping an eye on traffic was not happy about how long it was taking. He'd originally threatened to have the truck impounded if the guy hadn't arrived by 8:30 but apparently thought otherwise somewhere along the line. How here's hoping it'll take a relatively short time for them to replace all that mess.
Thursday, June 25, 2009
Jacksonville, FL - Who wants the what now?
After a rather annoyingly schedule run yesterday that delivered here in Jacksonville today, I have yet another assignment: a zero mile run. Yes, that's right, zero miles; every stop is within the city limits of Jacksonville. From the consignee for my last load to the drop lot with this loaded trailer was half a mile; from there to the load's consignee was another 4.3. I'll get a flat $25 for that, too, which works very much in my favor.
Of course, that's assuming that we ever can get the freight off the trailer. There's no bill of lading for this load. The guard at the drop lot said that all the paperwork should have been left with the trailer; since it's not there, she claimed, the other driver must have forgotten to leave it. After 35 minutes on hold to try talk with ops, I was given a rough explanation: it's a return load. Therefore, a bill of lading likely doesn't exist in the first place. I was given information to write up a bill of our own, but as soon as I handed it to the receiving office here they handed it back and said they can't accept those. So now I'm playing Qualcomm tag with operations trying to get someone to create a bill of lading and fax it here because they've explicitly said they won't accept the load until they have an original copy of that from the load's shipper.
I just received word that they've gotten in touch with the shipper (whoever they're holding responsible for this, anyway) and that it should be getting sent shortly. It's just really annoying that we have to go through all these hoops just to get a single pallet of freight unloaded...
Of course, that's assuming that we ever can get the freight off the trailer. There's no bill of lading for this load. The guard at the drop lot said that all the paperwork should have been left with the trailer; since it's not there, she claimed, the other driver must have forgotten to leave it. After 35 minutes on hold to try talk with ops, I was given a rough explanation: it's a return load. Therefore, a bill of lading likely doesn't exist in the first place. I was given information to write up a bill of our own, but as soon as I handed it to the receiving office here they handed it back and said they can't accept those. So now I'm playing Qualcomm tag with operations trying to get someone to create a bill of lading and fax it here because they've explicitly said they won't accept the load until they have an original copy of that from the load's shipper.
I just received word that they've gotten in touch with the shipper (whoever they're holding responsible for this, anyway) and that it should be getting sent shortly. It's just really annoying that we have to go through all these hoops just to get a single pallet of freight unloaded...
Monday, June 22, 2009
College Park, GA - Failtastic
I'd say it's been one of those days, but it's really been just one of those weekends overall. It started off promisingly enough, with a 1,000 mile run out of an area that I was worried wouldn't have any freight and enough spare time that I could, just maybe, earn a layover in Atlanta. I even managed to find parking at the Carlisle OC at about 10 PM on a Friday, as the shop was pulling dropped trailers out of the transient section. Unfortunately, that's about the last case of things going well.
First, I significantly overslept and didn't leave there until late Saturday morning. Then, while things were going reasonably well for most of the day, I had a tire blow out as I reached Statesville, NC. That cost me nearly four hours. It took over an hour just to get through to emergency maintenance; I found out during that call that they had exactly four people answering maintenance calls for our entire 14,000 truck fleet. Then it was nearly two and a half hours before Wingfoot arrived to replace the tire, and another half hour for the replacement to actually get bolted on. As such, while I'd originally planned on reaching Charlotte by about 5 or 6 PM, I didn't get there until after 10. This also ruined my plans of making Atlanta by Sunday morning; since I had a 9 AM appointment here I needed to be in Atlanta by about 8 AM yesterday in order to actually get paid for the layover.
So I decided at that point that I was going to stay in Charlotte instead, despite not having anything to do in the area, and leave at about 3 o'clock this morning to ensure that I'd get here on time. At least I was able to do that, as much as I loathe getting up that far before dawn. I wasn't able to get breakfast before I left, though, and due to concerns about the inevitable traffic jam in Atlanta I didn't want to risk leaving any later than I did. Sure enough, there were delays in Atlanta, including the smoldering remains of a car that bore an eerie resemblance to my own, but nothing as bad as I had expected. I attempted to park at a truck stop to get breakfast, but due to the place being badly overcrowded and my truck's clutch acting up in a way I haven't seen in ages, I just gave up, losing about 15 minutes and still being hungry.
I arrived here about 8:40, twenty minutes before my appointment. I should have figured something was amiss, given that it was showing an appointment for a drop and hook, though I have had a few of those before. But of course, they're starting to pull the same thing on me as they are on another driver: marking loads as drop and hook when they're really live unloads. It gets even more frustrating, though; while I was getting checked in, another truck pulled in and blocked me from getting to the docks, claimed he didn't have an appointment but he was supposed to be here anyway, then took the dock that I'd been assigned. Now they're unloading him while I'm backed into the dock next to him and my freight hasn't been touched. This means I'm losing even more time that I didn't really want to kill in the first place.
Of course, the freight situation down here is a perfect case of SNAFU. Over the weekend we didn't have enough capacity to cover the loads already in the system, which is why I was told I couldn't relay the load off at the Atlanta OC and keep the truck moving; this morning we've 18 more drivers than loads. This means that I could have dropped the relay, covered a load they needed saved, and there would have been drivers coming available that could have delivered this. I'm seriously starting to question if the trip planners even bother looking at anything other than the first number that comes up on the screen without thinking about the implications of things a day or two out. So while I could probably have helped them cover loads on the weekend and gotten some really good miles out of the deal, instead I'll probably be stuck waiting for more freight to pop up before I can go anywhere.
About the only other thing I can do at this point is try to call in, explain the situation, and see if they can try sneak me up the line for load assignments. I doubt that will go anywhere, though.
First, I significantly overslept and didn't leave there until late Saturday morning. Then, while things were going reasonably well for most of the day, I had a tire blow out as I reached Statesville, NC. That cost me nearly four hours. It took over an hour just to get through to emergency maintenance; I found out during that call that they had exactly four people answering maintenance calls for our entire 14,000 truck fleet. Then it was nearly two and a half hours before Wingfoot arrived to replace the tire, and another half hour for the replacement to actually get bolted on. As such, while I'd originally planned on reaching Charlotte by about 5 or 6 PM, I didn't get there until after 10. This also ruined my plans of making Atlanta by Sunday morning; since I had a 9 AM appointment here I needed to be in Atlanta by about 8 AM yesterday in order to actually get paid for the layover.
So I decided at that point that I was going to stay in Charlotte instead, despite not having anything to do in the area, and leave at about 3 o'clock this morning to ensure that I'd get here on time. At least I was able to do that, as much as I loathe getting up that far before dawn. I wasn't able to get breakfast before I left, though, and due to concerns about the inevitable traffic jam in Atlanta I didn't want to risk leaving any later than I did. Sure enough, there were delays in Atlanta, including the smoldering remains of a car that bore an eerie resemblance to my own, but nothing as bad as I had expected. I attempted to park at a truck stop to get breakfast, but due to the place being badly overcrowded and my truck's clutch acting up in a way I haven't seen in ages, I just gave up, losing about 15 minutes and still being hungry.
I arrived here about 8:40, twenty minutes before my appointment. I should have figured something was amiss, given that it was showing an appointment for a drop and hook, though I have had a few of those before. But of course, they're starting to pull the same thing on me as they are on another driver: marking loads as drop and hook when they're really live unloads. It gets even more frustrating, though; while I was getting checked in, another truck pulled in and blocked me from getting to the docks, claimed he didn't have an appointment but he was supposed to be here anyway, then took the dock that I'd been assigned. Now they're unloading him while I'm backed into the dock next to him and my freight hasn't been touched. This means I'm losing even more time that I didn't really want to kill in the first place.
Of course, the freight situation down here is a perfect case of SNAFU. Over the weekend we didn't have enough capacity to cover the loads already in the system, which is why I was told I couldn't relay the load off at the Atlanta OC and keep the truck moving; this morning we've 18 more drivers than loads. This means that I could have dropped the relay, covered a load they needed saved, and there would have been drivers coming available that could have delivered this. I'm seriously starting to question if the trip planners even bother looking at anything other than the first number that comes up on the screen without thinking about the implications of things a day or two out. So while I could probably have helped them cover loads on the weekend and gotten some really good miles out of the deal, instead I'll probably be stuck waiting for more freight to pop up before I can go anywhere.
About the only other thing I can do at this point is try to call in, explain the situation, and see if they can try sneak me up the line for load assignments. I doubt that will go anywhere, though.
Monday, June 15, 2009
Knoxville, TN - Oops I did it again
After spending the entire weekend in a hotel under the assumption that I just had to deliver to a place five miles up the road this morning, I came back to the truck at about 7:30 only to find that I'd been taken off that load and assigned something else. That's definitely not a good thing, since when I called yesterday morning, I was under the assumption I still had that delivery in Charlotte; had I been told that wasn't the case, I would have started moving on this load yesterday and delivered it right on time: seven o'clock this morning. The delivery window simply required me to deliver it by 2 PM, but by the time I had everything together - the paperwork, fuel, directions, and such - it was nearly 9 AM and I had to travel 300 miles, including a stint on US 74 (through a series of small towns with lots of traffic lights) and a ride through the Smokey Mountains on I-40. Needless to say, that wasn't happening.
Despite all that, and despite the fact that the entire situation could have been avoided had I just been in the truck like I probably should have been, somehow I'm not being blamed for a service failure on this load. A few rounds of Qualcomm tag later and I was first told that they were going to stay late to take me, then given a second message saying that they rescheduled it for tomorrow morning at 8 AM. The latter message left me slightly confused, since they (allegedly) open at 7; I was advised to try at seven and just hope for the best.
Thus I'm here in Knoxville with roughly 16 hours to kill. I'll probably head out of here around 6 to try arrive just after 7; it's about 60 miles away. In non-numeric terms, that means I have to get up at the butt-crack of dawn if I want to get breakfast before I hit the road. I don't have another work assignment yet, though I'm hoping one comes in overnight. Failing that I'll just call first shift while I'm being unloaded and hope they have some good news.
Despite all that, and despite the fact that the entire situation could have been avoided had I just been in the truck like I probably should have been, somehow I'm not being blamed for a service failure on this load. A few rounds of Qualcomm tag later and I was first told that they were going to stay late to take me, then given a second message saying that they rescheduled it for tomorrow morning at 8 AM. The latter message left me slightly confused, since they (allegedly) open at 7; I was advised to try at seven and just hope for the best.
Thus I'm here in Knoxville with roughly 16 hours to kill. I'll probably head out of here around 6 to try arrive just after 7; it's about 60 miles away. In non-numeric terms, that means I have to get up at the butt-crack of dawn if I want to get breakfast before I hit the road. I don't have another work assignment yet, though I'm hoping one comes in overnight. Failing that I'll just call first shift while I'm being unloaded and hope they have some good news.
Saturday, June 13, 2009
Charlotte, NC - Maintenance Downtime
After about a week off, I'm back on the road again. Coming out of the house I had yet another great run: over a thousand miles to central Pennsylvania. However, I also had a message telling me that I'm due for routine maintenance by the sixteenth. I didn't want to have to set up a relay on my very first load coming out of the house, so I delivered that load yesterday afternoon. Rather than merely hoping I was sent somewhere for maintenance, I called operations after dropping the trailer and asked them to find something that would get me through an OC. About ten minutes later, I was assigned a load that delivers here in Charlotte Monday morning.
The most stunning thing about the load? I had to deadhead (drive with an empty trailer) nearly three hundred miles to get it. I stopped about five miles from my pickup point, got there a few minutes late due to bad directions, get the trailer loaded, and went on my merry way. The load was far lighter than expected so I didn't have to scale or fuel up; I drove here with just a quick stop for lunch. After arriving in Charlotte just after 9 PM local time, I dropped the trailer in our lot, then went to talk to the mechanics. Only after I'd listed nearly a dozen items to get fixed did they say that I'd need to wait until tomorrow morning for the truck to be done; prior to mentioning that I needed work on the air conditioning (aka the ice maker) the estimator said I'd be able to get everything done in the express bay and be ready to go within two hours. I'll have to remember how quick the shop is down here since, usually, it's impossible to get anything done over a weekend.
Once all that was taken care of, I got a ride to the hotel and am enjoying the bliss of air conditioning while I type this up. I'm not sure what I'm going to do about the load, though most of that depends on whether or not the shop really can get the truck done by early tomorrow afternoon. If they do, then I'll probably need to ask operations to relay my current load off me so I can take something else and keep moving over the weekend. If the truck isn't going to be ready until late evening or sometime Sunday, I may need to at least inquire about a loaner to ensure that I can get layover pay since they've really become anal retentive about that sort of thing. Thankfully, they do have first shift available Saturday morning from 7 to 11 so I can talk to someone who may actually be willing to listen and consider all the options rather than simply reading from a script and following a flow chart.
However, none of this can happen until morning. There was a small chance of them getting my truck in tonight, but most likely it'll be 5 AM before anyone touches it. Everything hinges on what I find out when I call in the morning.
The most stunning thing about the load? I had to deadhead (drive with an empty trailer) nearly three hundred miles to get it. I stopped about five miles from my pickup point, got there a few minutes late due to bad directions, get the trailer loaded, and went on my merry way. The load was far lighter than expected so I didn't have to scale or fuel up; I drove here with just a quick stop for lunch. After arriving in Charlotte just after 9 PM local time, I dropped the trailer in our lot, then went to talk to the mechanics. Only after I'd listed nearly a dozen items to get fixed did they say that I'd need to wait until tomorrow morning for the truck to be done; prior to mentioning that I needed work on the air conditioning (aka the ice maker) the estimator said I'd be able to get everything done in the express bay and be ready to go within two hours. I'll have to remember how quick the shop is down here since, usually, it's impossible to get anything done over a weekend.
Once all that was taken care of, I got a ride to the hotel and am enjoying the bliss of air conditioning while I type this up. I'm not sure what I'm going to do about the load, though most of that depends on whether or not the shop really can get the truck done by early tomorrow afternoon. If they do, then I'll probably need to ask operations to relay my current load off me so I can take something else and keep moving over the weekend. If the truck isn't going to be ready until late evening or sometime Sunday, I may need to at least inquire about a loaner to ensure that I can get layover pay since they've really become anal retentive about that sort of thing. Thankfully, they do have first shift available Saturday morning from 7 to 11 so I can talk to someone who may actually be willing to listen and consider all the options rather than simply reading from a script and following a flow chart.
However, none of this can happen until morning. There was a small chance of them getting my truck in tonight, but most likely it'll be 5 AM before anyone touches it. Everything hinges on what I find out when I call in the morning.
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